


Sparking Drama

by aboxthecolourofheartache



Series: Machineries in Fire [4]
Category: Machineries of Empire Series - Yoon Ha Lee, 琅琊榜 | Nirvana in Fire (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Gen, Mu Nihuang is the best whatever universe she's in
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-05-29 05:49:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15066524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aboxthecolourofheartache/pseuds/aboxthecolourofheartache
Summary: Nihuang's life story thus far is so good the Hexarchate has to burn the books written about her, basically.  This doesn't stop the drama producers.  (Also I can't title things to save my life.)





	Sparking Drama

**Author's Note:**

> Yet more NiF/MoE fusion, this time with Nihuang as requested by [Akkisuitok](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Akkisuitok/pseuds/Akkisuitok)! Thank you for letting me drag you into the Nirvana in Fire madness!

Kel Mu Nihuang enjoys high table. Her cup is a pale green chalcedony, a gift from her little brother. Long use smoothed out the phoenix engraving to near invisibility, but she and her soldiers can feel the wide wings beneath their fingertips when the cup comes to their hands. Kel Nihuang holds her people lightly - as lightly as a general can, that is. More than half her staff are from her own annexed march, a rich border system abutting one of the Hep… Hexarchate’s most bellicose neighboring nations.

Command recognizes Kel Nihuang’s success because it is unquestionable and because she is popular. Nihuang tries not to become too popular, but her march loves her. Her battle record is unmatched, her formations impeccable, and her fame only continues to grow. Dramas borrow tidbits of her life.

Just after her promotion to general, a spate of high-grade entertainments produced plots about foreign princesses converting to true high calendar doctrine, bringing their grateful nations into the Hep… Hexarchate’s fold. In three out of five dramas, the princess narrowly avoids assassination by a rogue Shuos agent and is rescued by a Liozh love interest who turns out to be the true villain of the piece. He set the Shuos in motion to push her to his side, thinking her naive. From there, the plots differ but follow the same approximate formula: The princess enlists as a Kel foot soldier to hide from the machinations of the devious Liozh and his band of suborned Kel. Life as a foot soldier cannot quell the princess’s fire - she rises through the ranks like a true Ashawk! Her courage, her dauntless honor! The torrid affair with the Andan philanthropist in the second season cliffhanger! She confronts her ex-lover Liozh but cannot bring herself to kill him with her own hands, because he holds his stolen Kel ransom. Her foreign values betray her, and she refuses to sacrifice even corrupted Kel. The princess declares herself unfit for entry into Kel Command’s hivemind despite her sterling record. She takes to the background, but with dignity. The Hep… Hexarchs, obliterate the Liozh plot and her former lover, giving her peace of mind at last. Her people assimilate in her example.

It’s all very tragic. Some of the soundtracks are even listenable.

The other two dramas were deemed heretical almost immediately after their final editing stages and never made it to public viewing. Someone managed to leak the opening credits for one of them, though, and Nihuang decides that, heretical or closer to the truth or not, she’s glad it didn’t air. The costuming is winsome and the wigs? To say they are badly styled is generous.

At the high table, Kel Nihuang’s cup returns to her, and she finishes the gulp of water that’s left. She fills her plate, and so do her officers. Nihuang is often quiet as she eats, a habit retained from a childhood of different customs, but she knows her Kel will not relax if she does not put them at their ease. Formation instinct is not a problem for Kel Nihuang. Of course she submitted to the full process as part of the terms of her nation’s treaty with the people of the so-called high calendar. It was that or complete annihilation. Formation instinct ran up against the bastion of Nihuang’s sense of self and foundered as if on hidden reefs. She gets a jolt once and a while, and feels enough to know best how to feign full obedience. Otherwise, Nihuang sets it aside as yet another useful tool in her mental arsenal and continues about her business.

More than that, Nihuang loves her Kel not because they are Kel, but because they are soldiers under her command. She is responsible for them and their welbeing, on and off the battlefield. And so she starts the dinner conversation. “That novel you’ve all been passing around the last week - do you think I’d like it?”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Machineries in Fire by aboxthecolourofheartache [podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17192180) by [Rhea314 (Rhea)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhea/pseuds/Rhea314)




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